Downton Abbey fared better in the Christmas Day television ratings war than
initial viewing figures suggested, with an extra three million people
watching it later via a catch-up service.

The Christmas special of the ITV1 country house drama drew an audience of 10.28 million including “time-shifted” viewing over the next seven days using digital video recorders like Sky+.

This made Downton Abbey the second most watched programme on December 25, up from joint sixth in the overnight figures, behind the BBC soap opera EastEnders, which attracted 11.31 million viewers.

Rival period drama Call The Midwife on BBC1 came third in the “consolidated” chart including catch-up viewing, with an audience of 10.18 million.

This pushed ITV’s Coronation Street down from second into fourth place with 10.16 million viewers.

The updated viewing figures will be a relief for producers of Downton Abbey, whose well-reviewed two-hour Christmas special included the unexpected death of Matthew Crawley, one of the main characters.

Lord Julian Fellowes, the award-winning drama’s writer, has admitted that he would have loved to have kept Matthew Crawley in the series had Dan Stevens, the actor playing him, not chosen to leave the show.

Downton Abbey also proved to be very popular on catch-up services in 2011, when it topped the consolidated Christmas Day ratings.

This is the Christmas Day top ten based on consolidated figures, with the original overnight position in brackets: